Jay Z sees Kanye West as his “little brother”. The pair have been locked in a feud at times over the years but the ‘Empire State of Mind’ hitmaker insists he will always have a sibling-style relationship with the ‘Bound 2’ rapper.

Speaking to David Letterman on his My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman show, he said: “That’s my brother. We’re beyond friends. Like literally, my little brother is Kanye. And like your little brother, things happen sometimes. I have no problem [with him]. That’s still your sibling forever; that’s my brother … I’ve watched Kanye without an album. The thing I respect about him is that he is the same person [now as he was then].” Meanwhile, Jay Z previously admitted he and Kanye will always have a “complicated relationship” because of the “little underlying competition” they have with each other.

He shared: “I [talked to] Kanye the other day, just to tell him, like, he’s my brother. I love Kanye. I do. It’s a complicated relationship with us … ‘Cause, you know – Kanye came into this business on my label. So I’ve always been like his big brother. And we’re both entertainers. It’s always been like a little underlying competition with your big brother. And we both love and respect each other’s art, too. So it’s like, we both – everyone wants to be the greatest in the world. You know what I’m saying? And then there’s like a lot of other factors that play in it. But it’s gonna, we gonna always be good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that happens. In the long relationship, you know, hopefully when we’re 89 we look at this six months or whatever time and we laugh at that. You know what I’m saying? There’s gonna be complications in the relationship that we have to get through … But there’s genuine love there.”